Dems defend Etheridge, attack Breitbart
Ben Smith
June 14, 2010
Bob Etheridge's abject apology for roughing up an anonymous conservative videographer is being accompanied by a defense of the congressman from national Democrats.
"Motives matter, and I think you can see who was behind this," said DNC spokesman Brad Woodhouse just now. "This was a Republican party tracking operation. If it wasn't a party tracker or intern, why is the face blurred and why is the source hidden? You know if it had been a right wing blog, they'd identify themselves and they'd be booking this person on TV all day. Republicans know if they admit their involvement in this game of gotcha it will undermine their credibility. One minute this guy is interviewing a member of Congress on camera and the next a video is released with his face blurred out? If that doesn’t tell you this is a Republican Party hatchet job nothing will."
A national Democratic Party official e-mailed around a set of talking points about an hour ago, under the subject heading, "Etheridge Gotcha Video Background."
Democrats are seeking to raise questions about the video, which first appeared on Andrew Breitbart's Big Government, because of what's widely viewed as the media's mishandling of the ACORN story, which emerged without context from edited videos. In particular, party officials say the video was likely taken by a tracker for the Republican Party, which would explain the effort taken to conceal his identity.
The Democrats' talking points:
1. There is always the part of the story that you can’t see in these gotcha style videos — what were these folks doing, how did they approach him, how were the cameraman and/or others off camera acting?
2. Why would any legitimate student doing a project or a journalist shagging a story not identify themselves. Motives matter — what was the motivation here? To incite this very type of reaction?
3. This is clearly the work of the Republican Party and the “interviewer” is clearly a low level staffer or intern. That’s what explains blurring the face of the “interviewer” and refusing to identify the entity this was done for. The Republicans know if they were caught engaging in this type of gotcha tactic it would undermine their own credibility — yet if it was an individual acting on his own there is no reason that person would have blurred themselves out of the video — and if it was the work of a right wing blog they would have their logo on the video and be shouting their involvement from the roof top.
4. This was a purposefully partisan hit job designed to incite a reaction for political reasons — but it is a tactic so low — the parties involved are remaining anonymous.
5. The fact that no one wants to take credit for this should raise real questions in the minds of voters and the press.
6. Push hard w/ blogs the lack of credibility inherent to anything Breitbart does/posts, given its role in the debunked ACORN videos:
www.nytimes.com/2010/03/2...org/research/201006010001
gawker.com/5508190/okeefe...rn-videos-severely-edited
Still. It's pretty hard to think of a context in which Etheridge's assault on the videographer would be acceptable.
